Industrialism Comes To The South Seas

Fine Enterprise of William Watson of Rarotonga

From Our Own Correspondent RAROTONGA Anril 2 0 , , , RAKOiCJJNu-A, April pOR almost a century it has been the accepted prerogative of Australia and New Zealand to supply the Islands with manufactured goods. Now, here is a story of a man who has reversed the process to the extent of exporting 60,000 shirts and other articles from Cook Islands to New Zealand. rnn? e r r S f /illi f rr }. Wdison ’ business man of Rarotonga, and member of the Look Islands Legislative Council, and of the Rarotonga Island Council.

ALTHOUGH the sky-line of Rarotonga is not yet completely obscured by and smog', Mr. W.

Watson has made a good start in promot ing us all to organised industrialism. The Watson Shirt, Pant and Shoe factory, as it is locally known, is now a well-estab lished and profitable concern, but like most thines between Cancer and Capri corn, its beginnings were a little peculiar.

Mr. Watson had already made a small venture into the factory business during the war years, when he turned out pearl shell jewellery for the benefit of visiting American servicemen whose uncontrollable impulse to “take a curio home for Mom” had stripped these islands bare of every thing even faintly Polynesian. At the war’s end the Watson shell-cutting machinery was neatly packed away for some other time, and Mr. Watson started looking around him.

A native friend had recently returned from New Zealand where he had been given lessons in tailoring, so Mr. Watson sent some of his work to a New Zealand firm, solely with the idea of receiving in return, criticism and suggestions as to im

provement of the work in order to make it more widely saleable in the islands. To everyone’s dismay the NZ firm misunderstood the covering letter and sent back

a large order for goods “according to sample.”

NEVER at a loss, Mr. Watson took down all the bolts of material from his shelves then sent scouts round the island to round up all sewing machines that were in working order and to bring the owners with them to do the sewing.

The NZ order was thus laboriously filled, most of the work being hand-done, and, although there was no profit from this first order, Mr. Watson was now badly bitten with the factory bug. He followed his bundles of shirts to New Zealand and spent his time there visiting clothing fac tories to find out if there was a fancy method of making button holes or a trick to cutting out more than one garment at a time. Fortunately he arrived at the time of the War Disposal sales, so re

turned to Rarotonga with an ample num ber of modern sewing machines, large orders for his goods and a note book full of data on short cuts to the shirt business.

To-day the factory employs 65 hands working in two shifts on piece work rates.

Over 60,000 articles are exported to New Zealand annually, apart from those sold locally and to the outer islands in the Cook Group. Mr. Watson says that the native girls make excellent factory wor

kers, his only labour troubles arising from the fact that the girls stay at the factory only long enough to save up the boat fare to that Mecca of every Rarotongan— Auckland.

THE shoe factory had an equally acci dental beginning.

A local European resident, a cabinet maker by trade, in sheer desperation taught himself how to mend his own shoes. When Mr. Watson heard of this

he induced the gentleman to dismember some of the imported shoes in the store, then try to copy them. He did this in his own way and taught a number of native boys who, with their usual adaptability, improved on the original methods, so that now the only complaint we have against a Watson shoe is that it just won’t wear out —this because the factory stoutly re fuses to layer the soles with the result that we get double thickness solid leather in every shoe and suspect that the first shoe off the last is still trudging up and down the Avarua road.

Rarotongan shoes are now exported to Tonga, Niue, Samoa and New Caledonia and it is hoped that it will be possible to extend the trade to all Pacific islands.